


Into the Unknown

by shadow_prince



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Afterlife, Canon-ish, Existentialism, Foreboding, Literary Modernism, M/M, Major character un-death amirght, Mystery, Paranormal, Questionable use of books
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-12
Updated: 2019-02-12
Packaged: 2019-09-28 02:45:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17174378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadow_prince/pseuds/shadow_prince
Summary: Opening his eyes, he was laying on a hard floor, above him an endless abyss. There was no end, from what he could see, to the place above him. Just endless openness, until it faded to blackness too distant for his eyes to see.Sitting up, he touched his head gingerly, vaguely aware that something was wrong. On either side of him were towering bookshelves, stretching high into the air and disappearing from view as well. The shelves were filled with leather-bound tomes of all shapes and sizes, their spines pristine as if untouched by time.He struggled to his feet, peering behind him, but the sight was the same as that before him. An endless row of bookshelves, barring him on either side and stretching seemingly to infinity in all directions. He felt like he was forgetting something...but actually couldn’t remember anything at all.Written forRS Fireside Tales 2019





	Into the Unknown

**Author's Note:**

> For the prompt:
> 
> I will not let you go into the unknown alone. –Bram Stoker

Opening his eyes, he was laying on a hard floor, above him an endless abyss. There was no end, from what he could see, to the place above him. Just endless openness, until it faded to blackness too distant for his eyes to see.

Sitting up, he touched his head gingerly, vaguely aware that something was wrong. On either side of him were towering bookshelves, stretching high into the air and disappearing from view as well. The shelves were filled with leather-bound tomes of all shapes and sizes, their spines pristine as if untouched by time.

He struggled to his feet, peering behind him, but the sight was the same as that before him. An endless row of bookshelves, barring him on either side and stretching seemingly to infinity in all directions. He felt like he was forgetting something...but actually couldn’t remember anything at all. Had he always been here? Where was here? Curiously, he reached out and tried to pull a book off a shelf, but found it wouldn’t budge.

Walking slowly down the aisle, he occasionally reached out and tried to pull a book off the shelves he passed, but was unable to remove any of them. Nonetheless, he walked. _Stretch his legs,_ he thought, but what a silly notion. There was no feeling in his legs, so why would he need to stretch them?

Time was irrelevant, or perhaps nonexistent, but eventually he came to a break in the bookcases. Only to find an infinite number of more rows stretching to his left and right, and continuing before and behind him. Shelves in every direction, with books he couldn’t remove. With nothing else to do, he continued his walking one aisle to his left.

The books here, too, were not able to be withdrawn, but that didn’t stop him from trying.

_Like Sisyphus._

He froze. Where did that come from? Who was that? How does he know their name, but not his own?

He was still frozen in confusion when several paces ahead of him, a book fell off the shelf. It landed on the ground and the cover flipped open. Pages turned with blinding speed as if caught in a strong wind despite the still, stagnant air.

Unable to help his curiosity, he approached it slowly, and when he was only a step away, the book stilled. The binding laid flat, open to a page with a single quote written across it.

Lifting it gingerly in his hands like the most precious thing he had ever beheld, he gently flipped through the pages. All were blank - a pristine white as if just bound - except for the quote the book had opened to for him.

 

 _“The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our_  
_existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness.”_  
_―Vladimir Nabokov_

Sitting down, he held the book in his lap like a small child. Why did the quote appear? Where had it come from? And more importantly, what did it say about him and where he was? Was he in the crack of light between, or one of the two darknesses?

Peering up at the infinite darkness above him, he thought, it had to be the latter. Though, whether it was the darkness before or after the light, he couldn’t say. Perhaps it didn’t matter, since either promised an eternity of darkness. Did it matter which, when faced with forever wandering endless rows?

Around him, it seemed to grow a little bit darker the longer he sat thinking, so he once again climbed to his feet, opting to leave the book with its grim quote behind him.

However, as he once again walked between the shelves, he found he couldn’t leave the thought behind him as easily as he had the tome that held it. He wondered how the first darkness could be infinite when heading towards the promised sliver of life. If he was in the second, then surely all hope was lost.

And what was the sliver of light anyway? What made it so special, except perhaps a respite from the encroaching darkness?

Again, a book fell open, blocking his path with its frantic pages. This time though, he was not excited to lift it. He had not tried to remove a single book in his wanderings since he had left the last one behind.

Eventually though, his curiosity won out, kneeling in front of it until the pages stilled.

 

 _“If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be;_  
_and if all else remained, and he were annihilated,_  
 _the universe would turn to a mighty stranger.”  
_ _― Emily Jane Brontë_

 

He ran his fingertip over the pristine black text, once again searching for meaning in their delivery to him. The last one had been much more direct in their relation to his situation, but he struggled to see how this one correlated to him at all. This seemed to be from one person talking about another, but he was all alone. Had he ever known another?

Inexplicably, he longed for someone who would miss him like that, and whom he would miss like that if something were to happen to them. It was a mighty yearning - an ache in his chest, for something he had never known and never would.

It must be nice, he decided, to be loved like that. Though, it felt a bit like salt in a wound to send this quote to him when he was so terribly alone, so he quickly left the book behind and continued walking.

He was not even surprised when another book appeared, apparently this was going to be his new normal. Fluttering books with empty pages that appeared when they so desired and gave him no say in the matter.

 

 _“We have only a little time to please the living._  
_But all eternity to love the dead.”_ _  
_ _― Sophocles_

 

This one was rather bittersweet, he believed. He wasn’t sure how, but he felt like he knew what it was like to struggle to please someone. And even the second part resonated with him. An eternity to love the dead. It felt like, in another place, he had also been trapped with an eternity to love the dead.

Now however… now he couldn’t remember anyone at all. He remembered the words of the first quote; of the two eternities of darkness. The thought he had been pushing away for quite some time surfaced despite all his efforts to shove it away. Was _he_ dead? Was that why he couldn’t remember anyone, because he was now the one being remembered? Was someone on the other side of these quotes spending an eternity loving him because he was gone?

The Brontë quote had seemed irrelevant to him, but perhaps there was more to it than he was aware. Searching for memories of a life once lived was like trying to see the bottom of an inkwell. Still and viscous and futile. No matter how he tried to grasp for anything at all, it slipped between his fingers.

 _Annihilated_ . What a brutal word. Surely he hadn’t been _annihilated_ if indeed he were dead… Resolutely he closed the book and shoved it, perhaps a bit too roughly, back onto the shelf. If his walk was more of a run as he left it behind, well. It wasn’t like there was anyone there to see it.

So he ran. He ran between the shelves, choosing aisles at random when one ended and another began. For a while he ran down the column between the rows so that he wouldn’t risk another book appearing with their bloody confusing quotes. He ran and searched for an end, and when none was forthcoming, just endless rows of shelves, he once again ducked into the safety of the books. At least with them around him, it felt a little bit more secure. A little bit less unending. He refused to look up but could feel the darkness creeping in regardless.

He sat on the ground, shelf against his back and focused on the books in front of him. Tried to imagine nothing else around him, there were only him and these few books. In his mind, the shelf ended a few rows above him, as he felt that it should. It had no business stretching to infinity, there must be a beginning and an end.

A book wiggled as he stared, then fell to his feet, flipping until it lay open like all the others before it had. Resigned, he pulled it into his lap.

 

 _“The boundaries which divide Life from Death_  
_are at best shadowy and vague._  
 _Who shall say where the one ends,_  
 _and where the other begins?”  
_ _— Edgar Allan Poe_

 

The book fell from his fingers, landing between his legs soundlessly. He tried to take a gasping breath, only to realise he didn’t need to breathe, which made him panic even more. He was _dead._ Or at the very least, not alive. Holding his hands out before his face he saw they were not the hands of an old man, but young, the skin smooth, if dotted with a few scars though he had no memory of how he had received.

Was he returned to a younger age in death, or had he died young? What had his life been life? Had he achieved anything at all? Were there people who mourned him and remembered him? He was filled with an overwhelming longing and wistfulness, afraid that he had not done enough. That he had many things left that he wanted to do.

Reaching out to steady himself from the onslaught of emotions _―_ from his fear for much living he had left undone _―_ his hand found purchase against a shelf until a book beneath his palm _fell_ in response to his thoughts.

 

 _“He is terribly afraid of dying because he hasn’t yet lived.”_ _  
_ _― Franz Kafka_

 

The book disappeared as if sinking into a wormhole, being pulled to a completely different dimension. His head spun, leaving him dizzy with so many things to consider at once. Where had the book gone? Did this mean he could _send_ books to someone, maybe the same person who sent the quotes to him? The thought briefly distracted him from his panic over the life and death he couldn’t remember. He supposed if he was dead, then he had plenty of time to return to that panic, after considering the books.

Up until now he had assumed the books to be magical or possessed or something. But if he was able to send them as well, did that mean there was _someone_ behind the books coming to him? Was there someone else like him, wandering the endless rows of bookshelves? Maybe even here _with_ him? They were seemingly infinite, and he had no way of knowing how long he had been walking, but it was possible he just hadn’t met anyone _yet_ not that there wasn’t anyone there at all.

He read over the Poe quote again, but this time found less fear and more possibility in it. If he were able to send a book to someone, and this questioned the divide between life and death, then maybe he was even sending them to someone living? Was that possible? He laughed, though it made no noise. What did possible even mean, really?

He put the book back on the shelf and decide to walk some more. Occasionally panic would well up in him again, but he kept pushing it back with thoughts of magic rather than death. With possibility rather than endings.

The light around him, he had established by now, was most definitely tied to his thoughts. The more hopeful he was, the brighter the light, and the more negative, despairing, and doubtful, the darker it became. Currently, it was like a strobe, flashing bright before dipping darker. He thought it should hurt his head, and in some way it did, but without the actual pain associated with it.

When next a book landed before him, he found he was more excited than fearful like last time. He liked the idea of them being sent by another person, and decided to pretend they were like letters, of sorts.

 

 _“Will we ever stop being afraid of nights and death?”_ _  
_ _― Ray Bradbury_

 

Somehow, the quote didn’t make him more upset or filled with despair. He actually smiled at the anonymous person’s answer to his ponderings, but believed it didn’t _quite_ fit him. Perhaps it applied more to the person on the other end? Actually, the more he thought about the quotes he had received, the more it felt like a conversation, than supernatural messages to his exact thoughts and feelings. In this case, he didn’t feel like he had ever been afraid of the night, it almost sounded soothing to him.

Leaning his back against a shelf, he let his head rest against the unmoving books as he stared up, trying to imagine what night looked like. Or maybe he was trying to remember? If he was dead, then he must have seen night before.

His heart gave a mighty tug and he imagined if he could feel properly, he would be filled with warmth. Yes, he liked night when he was alive, he decided.

 

 _“I have loved the stars too fondly to be fearful of the night”_ _  
_ _― Galileo Galilei_

 

Beneath his head, he felt as a book fell away. Twisting around to be sure, he saw that yes. A book was missing from the shelf. He smiled brightly, excited at how much easier that memory had come to him. He hoped the person on the other side was excited to receive an answer so quickly.

Something else was tugging at his memory though. Leaning back at the shelf he resolved to stay there until it came to him. He felt like a dog chasing his tail, there was something there but it was just out of reach every time he lunged for it. Something about stars…

_Sirius._

Sirius! Sirius is a star. But it’s more than that. He felt like it was his star. But did that make sense? Did humans have a star? He turned the word over, felt it on his mouth. It was too familiar not to be important. Too familiar and too personal… perhaps… perhaps it was his name? Remembering his thought of a dog chasing its tail, he chuckled. Sirius was the dog star. Yes, his name had been Sirius. Was Sirius?

Was, he decided. He was still Sirius.

Around him, it seemed to grow a bit brighter. The darkness withdrawing with another memory of his life.

He stayed seated for a long time, but eventually got bored and decided to keep walking, replacing the book he was holding on the shelf.

It felt like a long time before another book arrived, but he had no way of knowing how much time passed. One moment blended seamlessly into the next, so they could be separated by breaths, or lifetimes, for all he knew.

 

 _“I will not let you go into the unknown alone.”_ _  
_ _― Bram Stoker_

 

Sirius’ heart gave a tremendous lurch, and he thought that if it were still capable of beating, it would be doing so rather faster than before. This felt precious, more important than all the rest. He wasn’t alone. Perhaps he was dead, but there was someone out there who would not let him go. Who would be here for him through it all.

Everything around him grew brighter. Euphoric, he reached out with surety and laid his hand on a shelf of books, closing his eyes.

 

 _“Love consists in this, that two solitudes_  
_protect and touch and greet each other.”  
_ _― Rainer Marie Rilke_

 

When he felt the book fall he opened his eyes, smiling brightly. He had done it! He still had no idea how the books really worked, but was glad that his determination had procured the exact words he needed from the depths of his forgotten memories, and sent them to the other person.

Sirius refused to leave behind this book, this promise that he was not alone, and resolved to carry it with him to the ends of the universe. For a long while he didn’t risk even closing it, fearful that the quote would disappear. But after a while he closed it with his finger between the pages to easier be able to walk again, though he checked that it was still there with regularity.

After a long stretch of silence, he wondered if by not returning this book to the shelf, he wouldn’t receive another one. He wasn’t ready to set it down yet though, even if that was the case. Although, he hadn’t returned the first one to a shelf either, he reasoned. He would wait a while longer and see…

It was with a great swell of relief that he knelt when a new one fluttered it’s pages at him, laying the Stoker quote open next to him so that he could read this new one.

 

 _“The greatest happiness of life is the_  
_conviction that we are loved --_  
 _loved for ourselves, or rather,_  
 _loved in spite of ourselves.”  
_ _― Victor Hugo_

 

Bubbling laughter filled his chest, he could almost hear it in his head. Sirius tapped his pointer finger on the last few words thoughtfully.

_...loved in spite of ourselves._

His lover - could he call them that? He decided he could, it wasn’t like anyone else would know or judge him anyway. His lover seemed to be a bit self-deprecating, but he discovered he wasn’t surprised. Was this someone that he knew? Had someone who had loved him in life been sending him these quotes?

There was no doubt in his mind that the conviction that he was loved was the greatest happiness he had ever known, both in life and death. Since realising that there was someone out there somewhere that cared for him, that would not abandon him to this eternity of darkness alone, he found that the darkness stayed away and his spirits remained brighter.

He wasn’t sure for how long it could last though. As he wandered the empty halls, even clinging to his book left Sirius with doubts and questions. How long would he be stuck here alone? He didn’t like being alone. He wanted to be with someone, he wanted to make them smile and laugh and for them to entertain him and keep him company.

In realising how distinctly uncomfortable he was in this location, he wondered if he were in hell. He was not a religious person, at least he didn’t think he had been, but surely heaven wouldn’t be somewhere so uniquely designed to make him, if not miserable, then at the very least forlorn.

He seemed to lack the energy to do more than just wander aimlessly, his feet dragging. So dazed and distracted was he, that Sirius startled when a book appeared in front of him.

 

 _“Whoever fights monsters should see to it that_  
_in the process he does not become a monster._  
 _And if you gaze long enough into an abyss,_  
 _the abyss will gaze back into you.”_ _  
_ _― Friedrich Nietzsche_

 

Sitting down, he noted mournfully how much lower the darkness above him hung from the last time one had appeared. How long had it been? It bothered him that he didn’t know.

It seemed the person communicating with him must have known his tendency for distracting thoughts. He realised belatedly that he hadn’t responded after the last quote. He had brushed his hand absently over a few books as he walked, but none had gone to his lover on the other side.

He felt silly calling them his lover. They didn’t know him. And how could they possibly love him, especially given that he was dead? Surely they deserved better than that. He wondered if they felt obligated to keep him company. If that’s why they kept sending him books. If he was unwittingly a burden to them.

When a book fell away this time, he didn’t even bother to look or confirm.

 

 _“The mind is its own place, and in itself can make_  
_a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven..”  
_ _― John Milton_

 

He almost regretted that his thoughts were going to the person on the other side. Either they would worry or they wouldn’t care and would stop sending him messages. He wasn’t sure which was worse.

Closing his eyes, he thought he could even feel the darkness getting closer. What would happen when it reached him? Would he be so consumed by it he could no longer see the books? Would it take him somewhere else? He imagined it was getting colder, but surely that was his mind playing tricks on him, since he couldn’t feel anything at all.

 

 _“Hold fast to dreams,_  
_For if dreams die_  
_Life is a broken-winged bird,_  
_That cannot fly.”_  
_― Langston Hughes_

 

He was still seated in the same spot when a book fell on top of the previous one. Cracking his eyes open, he saw that he was right. The black abyss above him hung much lower now. If he stood, he thought perhaps he could even reach up and touch it.

His vision was hazy as he read the quote. Poem? Poem, he decided. The thought of a poem from the other person made him want to smile. He could almost remember someone from before, someone who loved poetry. Someone he always teased for liking poetry.

Had he liked poetry, he wondered? Straining for the memory, was like trying to break the surface when swimming. He kicked harder, trying, trying, trying to break the surface.

 _Yes,_ there it is. There had been someone who liked poetry. Really liked poetry. And Sirius had responded with the most awful, bawdy poems he could find! He had spent hours looking for them, memorising them, just to make someone smile.

Was that who was sending these to him?

Sirius struggled to his feet, clutching the Stoker book in his hand. His walk was stumbling now, but he fought against it. He had to keep going. Had to find a memory he could send to the other person. He had to, for them, hold fast to dreams.

 

 _“As soon as you trust yourself, you will know how to live.”_ _  
_ _― Johann Wolfgang von Goethe_

 

He had just regained his normal gait, the darkness withdrawing bit by bit when this book landed, just before the end of the row. He didn’t even stoop to read it, but quickly stepped over it, frantically looking down the end of the aisles and turning right.

Sirius broke out in a run, the fastest he had ever run in life or in death. His arms pumped at his side, book clutched in his hand. Legs pounded the hard ground and he thought he could even hear them. Could hear blood rushing in his ears.

He pressed harder, faster, further. There had to be something else. He refused to believe there wasn’t. There was someone waiting for him.

When a swath of curtains appeared from nowhere, he had neither the time nor the desire to stop before he was crashing into them. Falling, falling, falling through their midnight violet velvet.

Sirius crashed into something warm and soft and they tumbled to the ground. He heard, _heard!,_ a sharp _oof_ , felt the sudden rush of air escaping from someone. Drawing back, he realised he is on the ground on top of someone.

His vision danced with spots and he realised _he needed to breathe_ and took a giant lung full, coughing and sputtering as it filled his lungs. Rolling off the person he struggled to calm his coughing, to find the proper pattern of breathing as his heart beat both too fast and too slow, struggling to find its rhythm as well.

 _“Padfoot?”_ The single word was whispered with reverence and Sirius looked up. Amber eyes bored into him like molten metal. Everything came rushing back to him - the war, the Ministry, his fight with Bellatrix and falling through the veil - and with a whine he threw himself at Remus, knocking them both flat on the ground all over again.

Hands were in his hair, running over his body, and he _felt all of it_. He felt the tears running hot down his face, felt the pulse pounding in Remus’ neck, felt the stuttering breaths of the man beneath him.

Sirius pulled back with some regret, but he needed to see him to be sure. He cupped Remus’ face, and asked “it was you, wasn’t it? It was you, Moony. You sent me quotes, from all your damn books.”

“You were getting them?! I thought… well at first I didn’t know, I thought there was just something off and the books were disappearing but then… then you send some back. And I hoped… but I thought I must be crazy.” Remus was staring at him with wonder and he struggled to sit up, never taking his eyes from Sirius’ face. “You were _dead._ You _died, Sirius.”_ His voice cracked like no other, breaking on the words how they were breaking Sirius’ heart.

His hand fell on the book on the floor next to him, and Sirius picked it up. Thumbing through it until he finds the solitary quote within.

 

 _“I will not let you go into the unknown alone.”_ _  
_ _― Bram Stoker_

 

“I carried it with me,” he whispered. “It was the only thing that got me through, to know that I wasn’t alone, even though it seemed like I was. And then when I almost gave up, you reminded me to keep dreaming. And you guided me back.” He didn’t care that he was on the floor sobbing, that he was completely disoriented, all that mattered was he was back with his Moony.

The delicate clearing of a throat, however, apparently did care. Looking up, Sirius was startled to see Minerva McGonagall frowning down at them. It filled him with a rush of déjà vu, except that she was much older than when she used to find them in compromising positions such as these when they were teenagers. Sheepishly, Sirius peered around at their surroundings for the first time, shocked to realise he knew where they were.

“The Restricted Section? We’re in Hogwarts?” he asked, with no small amount of surprise conveyed in his gravelly voice. But, he supposed, if you were going to come back from the dead, there were few places he found more likely for it to occur. He realised then that he had no idea how long he had been gone, or what had happened in his absence. He had so many questions but was too overwhelmed to give voice to any in that moment.

“Mr. Black, aren’t you supposed to be dead?” McGonagall asked, not unkindly.

“Can’t get rid of me that easily, Minnie,” he answered, even as he wiped tears from his cheeks. Rising unsteadily to his feet, Remus hurried to help him when his legs almost gave out. Curiously he noted a mirror peeking from between the cracks of thick violet velvet curtains. “The Mirror of Erised,” he said with hushed reverence, before looking to Remus for confirmation.

McGonagall tutted, but simply turned to Remus. “Professor Lupin, I think you should perhaps help your friend to the Hospital Wing. Once he has been thoroughly examined - and confirmed to be both he seems to be and _alive_ \- we can discuss this in greater detail.”

Remus threaded his warm fingers between Sirius’, and though he answered the woman, his eyes were glued to Sirius’ face. “Husband, actually, Headmistress.”

From the corner of his eye, Sirius saw the indulgent smile she gave into before turning to leave. “Of course, my mistake. Husband. Welcome back, Sirius.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my wonderful beta momstiel!


End file.
